Thursday - March 13, 2008

From the Halls of Montezuma to the Shores of . . . Berkeley?

Hat tip to Rachel Lucas

   Tuesday - March 11, 2008

Ukranian Special Forces On Parade

Day-um! I don’t know if this crew is spearheading the re-enlistment effort, or if they’re a special anti-terrorist squad ( the mere sight of this unit would give the muzzies apoplexy ), but I doubt if any regular soldiers have trouble standing to attention when they pass in review.

This pic is all over the internet, but I think it started out here.

The photographer’s postition seems somehow appropriate too.

   Saturday - March 01, 2008

gunboat diplomacy?

US, in Message to Syria, Sends Warship to Lebanon

Jerusalem (CNSNews.com) - A Hizballah parliamentarian accused the United States on Friday of raising tensions in the Middle East after the U.S. sent a Navy warship to a position off the coast of Lebanon. “The American move threatens the stability of Lebanon and the region and it is an attempt to spark tension,” Reuters quoted Hizballah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah as saying.

Fadlallah said Hizballah would not “succumb to threats and military intimidation practices by the United States to implement its hegemony over Lebanon.”

He was also quoted in a separate report as saying that the deployment of the U.S. warship “is a proof that the American administration has failed in imposing its policies and hegemony on our region.”

On Thursday, an official in Washington was quoted as saying that the USS Cole would stay in the area “indefinitely” as a “show of support for regional stability.” The BBC said the warship also serves as a warning to Syria. The U.S. is backing the government of Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Sinora in its standoff against Hizballah and other pro-Syrian factions in the Lebanese government. Syria is believed by many to be behind a series of assassinations of pro-Western, anti-Syrian politicians and prominent figures over the last three years. National Security Advisor Gordon Johndroe said that President Bush is concerned about the situation in Lebanon, which has not had a president since November. Elections have been delayed 15 times since then - most recently, this week. The BBC said there are fears that the political deadlock could lead to escalating sectarian violence.

CNS News source

   Thursday - February 14, 2008

Excellent Marketing

Navy to shoot down ailing satellite

I don’t know if it’s part of the SDI system or not, but the US Navy is going to try to shoot down that ailing spy satellite that’s been in the news. They’re going to launch a missile at the thing from a cruiser. This will discussed today at a Pentagon briefing at 2:30 EST. Live streaming media from Fox News affiliate http://www.kpho.com . I don’t know when the shoot is going to happen, but the satellite’s orbit is decaying rapidly, so they only have a window of opportunity that’s a week or two wide.

U.S. officials said the Pentagon is planning to shoot down a broken spy satellite expected to hit the Earth in early March.

The Associated Press has learned that the option preferred by the Bush administration will be to fire a missile from a U.S. Navy cruiser and shoot down the satellite before it enters Earth’s atmosphere.

The satellite is outfitted with thrusters, small engines used to position it in space, that contain the toxic rocket fuel hydrazine. Hydrazine can cause harm to anyone who contacts it.
The satellite, known by its military designation USA-193, was launched in December 2006. It lost power and its central computer failed almost immediately afterward, leaving it uncontrollable. It carried a sophisticated and secret imaging sensor.

U.S. officials do not want this equipment to fall into the wrong hands.

The Delta II rocket carrying spy satellite USA-193/NRO L-21 launches Dec. 14, 2006, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
What goes up	WILL come down whenever we want it to. And don’t you forget it.

So we will see the US Navy

• actively protecting the world from bad things falling from space,


• showing all our enemies that we can knock stuff down from orbit even from our ships,


• keeping sooper-secret spy stuff from falling into the wrong hands, and


• giving a show that either
  1) SDI is fully operational and can also be ship based, or
  2) the latest Aegis upgrade is working perfectly.

Any way you look at it, this is excellent publicity for the Navy and the Bush administration. Assuming, of course, that it works. Keep your fingers crossed.

PS - the destroyer in the picture is the USS John S. McCain, DDG 56. The ship was named after Admirals John S. McCain and John S. McCain Jr., the grandfather and father of Navy veteran and Arizona Senator John S. McCain III, whom you may have heard of. I have no idea if this is the ship that will be used, but I doubt it.

news source I and news source II

   Monday - January 21, 2008

THE GREAT ESCAPE, BRIT HERO OF THE STORY PASSES AWAY.

THE GREAT ESCAPE, BRIT HERO OF THE STORY PASSES AWAY.If you saw the movie with Steve McQueen you might have thought the hero was American.  In a way I suppose all those guys who tried it knowing the odds and knowing their enemy, were heros. 

Hero made 13 wartime bids for freedom
By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent
Last Updated: 11:13pm GMT 19/01/2008

Bertram “Jimmy” James, described by one military historian as Britain’s greatest war hero, escaped from 13 German prisoner-of-war camps and was one of 76 officers who escaped from Stalag Luft III on the night of March 24, 1944.

Fifty of them were executed on Hitler’s orders after being recaptured, but the RAF squadron leader survived the war and outlived the century, to die peacefully on Friday, aged 92.

Although he was recaptured, he was sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp, from which he escaped again, only to be caught again after 14 days on the run.

The British officer’s adventures in Germany began in May 1940 when his Wellington bomber was shot down over the Netherlands, which had recently been overrun by the Nazis.

The military historian Howard Tuck, a close friend of the veteran, said that James had dug the first RAF escape tunnel of the war, at Stalag Luft I, in Bart, in 1941.

“He was the country’s greatest living war hero. He had a truly remarkable life,” said Mr Tuck. “This guy was truly unique and he was the finest gentleman anyone could ever meet. To me, he represented not only an era, but a type of Englishman you rarely meet. He was honest and funny, and I used to talk to him like he was 25.”

http://tinyurl.com/374slk

   Friday - January 04, 2008

Remember the Lancet Study that had a widely disputed High Count of Iraq Casualties?

Data Bomb

By Neil Munro and Carl M. Cannon, National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Friday, Jan. 4, 2008

Three weeks before the 2006 midterm elections gave Democrats control of Congress, a shocking study reported on the number of Iraqis who had died in the ongoing war. It bolstered criticism of President Bush and heightened the waves of dread—here and around the world—about the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

Published by The Lancet, a venerable British medical journal, the study [PDF] used previously accepted methods for calculating death rates to estimate the number of “excess” Iraqi deaths after the 2003 invasion at 426,369 to 793,663; the study said the most likely figure was near the middle of that range: 654,965. Almost 92 percent of the dead, the study asserted, were killed by bullets, bombs, or U.S. air strikes. This stunning toll was more than 10 times the number of deaths estimated by the Iraqi or U.S. governments, or by any human-rights group.

In December 2005, Bush had used a figure of 30,000 civilian deaths in Iraq. Iraq’s health ministry calculated that, based on death certificates, 50,000 Iraqis had died in the war through June 2006. A cautiously compiled database of media reports by a London-based anti-war group called Iraq Body Count confirmed at least 45,000 war dead during the same time period. These were all horrific numbers—but the death count in The Lancet’s study differed by an order of magnitude.

Queried in the Rose Garden on October 11, the day the Lancet article came out, Bush dismissed it. “I don’t consider it a credible report,” he replied. The Pentagon and top British government officials also rejected the study’s findings.

Such skepticism would not prove to be the rule.

CBS News called the report a “new and stunning measure of the havoc the American invasion unleashed in Iraq.” CNN began its report this way: “War has wiped out about 655,000 Iraqis, or more than 500 people a day, since the U.S.-led invasion, a new study reports.” Within a week, the study had been featured in 25 news shows and 188 articles in U.S. newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.

Editorials in many major newspapers cited the Lancet article as further evidence that the invasion of Iraq was a bad idea, and the liberal blogosphere ridiculed Bush for his response. Prominent mainstream media outlets quoted various academics who vouched for the study’s methodology, including some who said they had reviewed the data before publication.

Within a few weeks a backlash rose, although the contrarian view of the study generated far less press attention than the Lancet article. In the ensuing year, numerous skeptics have identified various weaknesses with the study’s methodology and conclusions. Political blogs and academic journals have registered and responded to the objections in a debate that has been simultaneously arcane and predictable. The arguments are arcane because that is the nature of statistical analysis. They are predictable because that is the nature of today’s polarized political discourse, with liberals defending the Lancet study and conservatives contesting it.

How to explain the enormous discrepancy between The Lancet’s estimation of Iraqi war deaths and those from studies that used other methodologies? For starters, the authors of the Lancet study followed a model that ensured that even minor components of the data, when extrapolated over the whole population, would yield huge differences in the death toll. Skeptical commentators have highlighted questionable assumptions, implausible data, and ideological leanings among the authors, Gilbert Burnham, Riyadh Lafta, and Les Roberts.

Some critics go so far as to suggest that the field research on which the study is based may have been performed improperly—or not at all. The key person involved in collecting the data—Lafta, the researcher who assembled the survey teams, deployed them throughout Iraq, and assembled the results—has refused to answer questions about his methods.

Some of these questions could be resolved if other researchers had access to the surveyors’ original field reports and response forms. The authors have released files of collated survey results but not the original survey reports, citing security concerns and the fact that some information was not recorded or preserved in the first place. This was a legitimate problem, and it underscored the difficulty of conducting research in a war zone.

Each death recorded by the Hopkins surveyors in 2006 extrapolated to 2,000 deaths in the Iraqi population.

Over the past several months, National Journal has examined the 2006 Lancet article, and another [PDF] that some of the same authors published in 2004; probed the problems of estimating wartime mortality rates; and interviewed the authors and their critics. NJ has identified potential problems with the research that fall under three broad headings: 1) possible flaws in the design and execution of the study; 2) a lack of transparency in the data, which has raised suspicions of fraud; and 3) political preferences held by the authors and the funders, which include George Soros’s Open Society Institute.

Source and Rest of article

   Thursday - November 29, 2007

EU emission rules could limit Army vehicles

Hey Drew ..Doc Jeff ... Mr C and anyone else interested. Wanna inlist?  Incentives include bad housing, lack of ammo at times, not near enuff appreciation but hey ... you get to risk life and limb .... oh the glory of it.

EU emission rules could limit Army vehicles
By Laura Clout
Last Updated: 2:39am GMT 29/11/2007

The fighting capability of the Army’s new generation of armoured vehicles could be limited by European rules on greenhouse gas emissions.

To avoid breaching the EU rules, the 3,000 vehicles must be specially designed to limit the damage to the environment in the battlefield.

However, critics claim that this could compromise their fighting effectiveness and say protecting British troops should take priority over complying with the regulations.

The design of the armoured vehicles - called Future Rapid Effect System (FRES), is yet to be finalised, but each will be fitted with cutting edge electronic equipment.

At the request of the Ministry of Defence, the design will incorporate defences against roadside bombs and rocket-propelled grenades.

Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary, fears the EU rules could prevent soldiers from being able to share fuel with American allies.

He said yesterday: “At a time when equipment shortages in Iraq and Afghanistan are leading to the deaths of our brave service personnel, it is preposterous that this Government is pre-occupied with whether our military vehicles are compliant with EU environmental regulations.

“They should be built to protect our forces and to enable them to carry out the tasks asked of them. The Government needs to wake up and realise that we are fighting two wars.”

The MoD has admitted that FRES will have to meet rules that cut emissions from cars, vans and lorries.

A spokesman said: “Our first priority for FRES is to provide capability and protection for our troops. Decisions about fuel and emissions - although important - are secondary and should not impair our ability to conduct operations.”

The award of the £16 billion FRES contract has been beset by delays and the vehicles are not expected to be ready until at least 2012. In February, the Commons defence committee said it had been a “sorry story of indecision… and delay”.

   Friday - November 23, 2007

Honoring Heroes at the Holidays

I received an email from Ryan Gill of ”Move America Forward” asking for some help in promoting this event.  It sounds very worthy, so if you are along the route, go out and support the effort.

Join Move America Forward for the “Honoring Heroes at the Holidays Tour” this November 26th - December 16th as we cross this nation holding pro-troop events in 40 cities across America to honor and salute the men and women of the U.S. military who will be thousands of miles away from their homes and families during this holiday season.

Along the tour we will be collecting more than 100,000 Christmas, Hanukkah and holiday greeting cards for our troops that we will deliver to them in Iraq and Afghanistan. Get your kids involved, and invite local schools to participate! On the outside envelope be sure to write either: “Christmas Card for Our Troops” or “Hanukkah Card for Our Troops” or “Holiday Card for Our Troops.”

Bring the cards to one of our 40 pro-troop holiday events along the route of the “Honoring Our Heroes at the Holidays Tour”

   Thursday - November 01, 2007

Real Heroes, Real Soldiers, and a real reporter

h/t to powerline

Jeff Emmanuel from RedState.com, embedded in Iraq, shows what real combat reporting ought to be. Al Qaeda in Iraq is on the ropes because we have troops like these guys from Charlie Company. It’s a 20 minute read you do not want to miss.

In Jeff’s own words,

In my opinion, this is the type of heroic story that has been missing from the mainstream media’s coverage of the War on Terror—and it is precisely the type of story that the American people need to hear. Being the one who had the opportunity to write about it and to bring it to the public’s attention—something which was only possible because I, like the very small number of my colleagues who do this, was willing to go to a place (and take a risk) that others will not—was an amazing and humbling experience.

If you haven’t read Jeff’s work yet, you will after this. He’s just as good as Michael Yon.  Read the original rendition with pictures at his site, or read it in an easy reading font at The American Spectator.

Ambush In Sammara: The Longest Morning


Six weeks ago in the Iraqi city of Samarra, four paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division became the object of a pre-planned, coordinated effort by dozens of al Qaeda to kidnap and slaughter American soldiers only days before General Petraeus’s internationally televised testimony to the U.S. Congress on the state of the war in Iraq. Only two survived—but, fighting like heroes, they succeeded in preserving the honor of their nation.

This is their story.

You don’t need me to snag more excerpts than this to entice you to read it. Just go and do it.

   Wednesday - October 31, 2007

Jury Sides with Family against Westboro BC wackos..

about time…
Nearly $11 Million award to Family of Marine KIA

Father of slain Marine wins case against funeral protesters
Pa. man awarded nearly $11 million in compensatory and punitive damages

By Matthew Dolan | Sun reporter
5:54 PM EDT, October 31, 2007

The brokenhearted father of a Marine killed in Iraq won a long-shot legal fight today after a federal jury in Baltimore awarded him nearly $11 million in a verdict against members of a Kansas church who hoisted anti-gay placards at his son’s Westminster funeral.

The jury’s announcement 24 hours after deliberations first began was met with tears and hugs from the family and supporters of Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, whose March 2006 funeral was protested by members of the Westboro Baptist Church with signs including “Thank God for dead soldiers.”

Snyder’s father, Albert, won on every count of his complaint, as well as $2.9 million for compensatory damages and $8 million for punitive damages.

Over the past week, the civil trial in U.S. District Court in Baltimore turned into a constitutional debate over how far the First Amendment should extend to protect the most extreme forms of expression. The groundbreaking verdict is believed to be the first time the fundamental Christian church from Topeka that is composed mainly of family members has been successfully sued for its shock funeral protests.

One legal expert worried that the initial size of the compensatory judgment, which was awarded first, could be a setback for those who believe in broad free-speech protections.

“The award—$2.9 million—is an awful lot of money for compensatory damages,” University of Maryland law professor Mark Graber said today. “This was in a public space. While the actions are reprehensible, the First Amendment protects a lot that’s reprehensible.”

U.S. District Judge Richard D. Bennett, who had sealed the church’s financial documents, said from the bench that the compensatory damage award would already eclipse Westboro’s assets.

A decision in the free speech case was closely watched after Westboro members criss-crossed the country in recent years, turning somber funerals of soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan into attention-grabbing platforms to criticize gays as immoral and damned.

Carrying brightly colored signs with inflammatory messages at reportedly more than 30,000 protests, including hundreds of military funerals, members of the congregation say the nation is losing soldiers on the battlefield because the country has been too accepting of gays in every part of American society, including in the military.

Counter-protests often follow and groups like the Patriot Guard have cropped up to try to shield families from the church’s controversial signs and songs.

Alarmed by Westboro protests, at least 22 states enacted or proposed laws to limit the rights of protesters at funerals. Only months after Matthew Snyder’s death, Maryland passed a law prohibiting people from picketing within 100 feet of a funeral, memorial, burial or procession.

The courtroom fight came down to whether Westboro had a legal right to demonstrate at the March 2006 funeral of Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder or whether the protesters crossed the line because their message impugned the grieving family’s reputation and unlawfully invaded the Snyders’ privacy.

The Marine’s father from York, Pa., sued the church and three of its members for intentionally invading his privacy because his deceased son did not have that right any longer. For the claim to be successful, the jury needed to conclude that the church’s actions at the funeral—and later, in a posting about Matthew Snyder on its Web site—were “highly offensive to a reasonable person,” according to the jury instructions.

Albert Snyder also claimed that the church’s actions were an intentional infliction of emotional distress. Under the law, the five women and four women of the jury needed to find that the church’s conduct was “intentional or reckless” to find for Snyder. Jury instructions also required that the conduct be “extreme and outrageous,” leading to severe emotional distress.

“You must balance the defendants’ expression of religious belief with another citizen’s right to privacy,” presiding judge Richard D. Bennett instructed jurors yesterday.

The weeklong trial brought together Snyder and his family and the progeny of Fred Phelps Sr., a retired attorney and founder of Westboro whose 71-member congregation is largely made up of his relatives. The suit names the church as defendants, as well as Phelps and his two daughters.

In the courtroom, the Phelps family dressed plainly. In testimony, they stood steadfast to their beliefs and did not apologize for their conduct.

Often overcome by emotion, Albert Snyder sat flanked by his attorneys. While the Westboro’s attorney, Jonathan Katz, spoke, Snyder averted his eyes. But when the videos made of the protest at his son’s funeral aired for the jury in closing arguments, he wept.

When called to the stand last week, the father railed against Westboro, saying that sight of the protest made him physically ill.

“They turned this funeral into a media circus, and they wanted to hurt my family,” Snyder testified, according to the Associated Press. “They wanted their message heard, and they didn’t care who they stepped over. My son should have been buried with dignity, not with a bunch of clowns outside.”

Fred Phelps took the stand after Snyder and prompted a strong admonition from Bennett when the pastor said he had not considered whether children would see a sign carried by protesters with the words “Semper Fi Fags” and two stick figures that appeared to be engaged in sodomy, according to the AP.

Church members always insisted that their March 10, 2006, demonstration took place legally, 1,000 feet from St. John Roman Catholic Church where the funeral was held. In closing arguments, the two sides battled over the nature of the protest to determine if the speech was constitutionally protected.

Sean E. Summers, Snyder’s attorney, pointed out that Westboro members personally targeted the family because they brought Marine-specific signs to their rally at the funeral and dredged up Snyder’s marital history on their Web site in an essay, “The Burden of Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder.”

But Katz argued that the protest was no different from the thousands of others taken up by Westboro. Nothing about their demonstration was so offensive or damaging, the defense attorney said, to rise to the level of a libelous attack on the family.

Past protests by Westboro have produced so much negative reaction that they routinely alert local police departments of their plans so police can provide additional security. The defendants staged another protest on Pratt Street near the U.S. District courthouse at lunchtime today before the verdict was announced.

What sometimes took a back seat in the federal free speech trial was the life and death of Lance Cpl. Matthew A. Snyder, a 2003 Westminster High School graduate. Synder, a victim of a vehicle accident in Anbar province in March 2006, had been in the war zone less than a month.

Snyder’s sexual preference never became an issue at the trial. Church members said they did not target Snyder’s funeral because they believed the Marine was gay.

Instead, they said they waved fire-and-brimstone placards—“Thank God for IEDs” and “Fag Troops” among others—near the funeral motorcade to bring attention to their message.

Snyder testified that he never saw the content of the signs as he entered and left St. John’s Roman Catholic Church on the day of his son’s funeral. He glimpsed the signs for the first time during television news reports later that day. A Google search on the Internet weeks later led him to the church’s Web site and the posting about Matthew Snyder.

Source

Westboro probably can’t afford to pay the award , but if it makes them think twice or have to shut down.. Good Riddance to those Scumbags

   Friday - October 26, 2007

Thank You Senator McCain

DJ Drummond remided me that it was 40 years ago today that Lt. Commander John McCain, USN, was shot down on a combat mission over Hanoi.  He was in the “Hanoi Hilton” for five and a half years, suffering torture and humilation.  He represents the finest traditions and honor of the United States Navy.  No matter what you think of his politics, he is indisputably one of our finest heroes from the Vietnam era.

Thank you, John McCain, for your service and for your sacrifice.

   Tuesday - October 02, 2007

Military Rules

My brother, the leatherneck, forwarded this to me:

Marine Corps Rules:
1.  Be courteous to everyone, friendly to no one.
2.  Decide to be aggressive enough, quickly enough.
3.  Have a plan.
4.  Have a back-up plan, because the first one probably won’t work.
5.  Be polite. Be professional. But, have a plan to kill everyone you meet.
6.  Do not attend a gunfight with a handgun whose caliber does not start with a ‘4.’
7.  Anything worth shooting is worth shooting twice. Ammo is cheap. Life is expensive.
8.  Move away from your attacker. Distance is your friend. (Lateral & diagonal preferred.)
9.  Use cover or concealment as much as possible.
10. Flank your adversary when possible. Protect your flank.
11. Always cheat; always win. The only unfair fight is the one you lose.
12. In ten years nobody will remember the details of caliber, stance, or tactics. They will only remember who lived.
13. If you are not shooting, you should be communicating your intention to shoot.

Special Forces Rules:
1.  Look very cool in sunglasses.
2.  Kill every living thing within view.
3.  Adjust your speedo.
4.  Check hair in mirror.

Army Rangers Rules:
1.  Walk in 50 miles wearing a 75 pound rucksack, while starving.
2.  Locate individuals requiring killing.
3.  Request permission via radio from Higher-ups, to perform the killing.
4.  Curse bitterly when mission is aborted.
5.  Walk out 50 miles wearing a 75 pound rucksack while starving.

US Army Rules:
1.  Curse bitterly when receiving operational order.
2.  Make sure there is extra ammo and extra coffee.
3.  Curse bitterly.
4.  Curse bitterly some more.
5.  Do not listen to 2nd LTs; it can get you killed.
6.  Curse bitterly.

Air Force Rules:
1.  Have a cocktail.
2.  Adjust temperature on air-conditioner.
3.  See what’s on HBO.
4.  Ask ‘What is a gunfight?’
5.  Request more funding from Congress, with a ‘killer’ Power Point presentation.
6.  Wine & dine ‘’key’ Congressmen, invite DOD & defense industry executives.
7.  Receive funding, set up new command and assemble assets.
8.  Declare the assets ‘strategic’ and never deploy them operationally.
9.  Hurry to make 13:45 tee time.
10. Make sure the base is as far as possible from the conflict but close enough to have a tax exemption.

Navy Rules:
1.  Go to Sea.
2.  Drink Coffee.
3.  Deploy Marines

Before you go jumping my case, remember that this came from a Marine

   Thursday - September 20, 2007

Deployment Bill Killed

From our local news

Deployment Bill Killed

The Senate played spoiler on Wednesday to a bill authored by Virginia Senator Jim Webb.

In a 56 to 44 vote, the Senate has blocked a bill that would have regulated the amount of time troops spend in combat. Senator Webb tailored the bill to give the military the same time at home as they spend deployed.

Those in opposition say the military should manage deployments, not Congress. Most Army soldiers currently spend 15 months in combat and 12 months at home.

You think?  You mean that the politicians shouldn’t be disctating to the military how to do its job?  Whodathunkit?

   Monday - September 17, 2007

Hmm, quite different from Cindy Sheehan’s Response

Found this article linked from Newsvine.. source is TheRawStory ... Far from a conservative Source… of course they have to add a jab to Bush at the end.. They can’t understand the Difference of him using 1 KIA name compared to the way the Anti-war protesters are using the names of KIA’s....such is the Left

Fox News spoke on Friday to the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq who is upset about anti-war protesters’ plans to stage a “die-in” using the names of actual war dead.

Merrillee Carlson, national chair of Families United for our Troops and Their Mission, told Fox, “When somebody goes and abuses our son’s courage and heroism by using it in this manner, it just strikes right to the heart and causes such pain that is unbelievable.”

“I think the name ‘die-in’ is offensive,” suggested one of the Fox hosts, “but I want to ask you this. Most Americans, if you ask them, cannot name one soldier or marine who’s been killed in combat. ... This arguably, at least, heightens the awareness that there are people, in fact, dying in this war. ... Do you see any merit in that?”

“They’re not doing it in a way to honor them,” insisted Carlson. “They’re doing it in a way to abuse them. to dishonor them, because they’re using it anti-war. ... The protesters are going against everything that these young men and women believed in and that’s what’s disgraceful about it.”

The anti-war protesters are not the only ones invoking the memory of those killed in Iraq. In his speech on Thursday, President Bush used the name of one of the war dead, Army Spc. Brandon Stout, to highlight the necessity of sacrifice in “a war of good and evil.”

The following video is from Fox’s Fox & Friends, broadcast on September 14.

Source

When he was a senior in high school, Army Sergeant Michael Carlson, son of Merrilee and Daniel Carlson, wrote a three-page credo that was recently published in the Wall Street Journal.

“When I am on my deathbed, what am I going to look back on? Will it be thirty years of fighting crime and protecting the country of all enemies, foreign and domestic? I want my life to account for something… I only have so much time. I want to be good at life; I want to be known as the best of the best at my job. I want people to need me, to count on me… I want to fight for something, be part of something that is greater than myself. I want to be a soldier...”

After serving nearly four years in the Army, including a final stint with the Ice Platoon (82nd Engineers), Michael, 22, fulfilled those prophetic words. During a night mission, his platoon was assigned to cordon off and take out of commission, two bomb-making factories. As the Bradley they were driving was going over a culvert in the roadway, the culvert gave way and the vehicle rolled over backwards into the water. Seven soldiers were in the Bradley; five died, including Michael. A rescue unit was able to save two other soldiers, in large part because before he died, Michael was able to partly pry open the hatch in the vehicle. Says Merrilee, “We are privileged to have men and women serving in the military who are willing to give their lives, their time, and their energy to preserve, protect and defend our freedom.”

News

* Merrilee Carlson spoke to WCCO-TV in Minneapolis at a recent Families United event.

* “We can’t leave this work undone in Iraq. We can all argue about how we might have gotten there. But we’re there and we need to see it through....I suppose we could have taken the beaches at Normandy,’’ Merrilee said, “and then decided it was too expensive or too difficult to keep going. I wonder what the world would look like today.’’ Read more of Mrs. Carlson’s interview with the St. Paul Pioneer Press here.

* Daniel Carlson said his son’s essay and the response to it have eased the pain of losing him, and he continues to believe that the U.S. effort will lead to a better, freer Iraq and a safer America. “He didn’t die in vain,” he said. “It will come.” Minneapolis Star Tribune 5/29/05

source of above on Families United for our Troops and Their Mission

Link to the 3 Page PDF of the essay her son wrote in School in May 2000

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Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

1. Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
2. Stay involved with government on every level and don't let those bastards get away with a thing
3. Use every legal means to defend yourself in the event of real internal trouble, and, most importantly:
4. Keep talking to each other, whether here or elsewhere

It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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